Finally, a tablet simple enough for a woman to use </sarcasm>

Do iPads or Nexus 7s scare and confuse you? ePad Femme is here to help!

The ePad Femme: for women everywhere who have no interests except their own bodies and having babies, which is apparently all of them.

At long last, a company has designed a tablet fit for the use of an entire gender that has, thus far, apparently gone unserved. The ePad Femme, designed and distributed by the Eurostar Group, is an eight-inch tablet that comes pre-loaded with apps concerning yoga, grocery shopping, and cooking. Thank the heavens, ladies may never trouble their pretty heads with such difficulties as finding and downloading their own apps ever again.

The tablet was first announced back in October but received a marketing push in February as “the perfect Valentine’s Day gift,” noted one site. The tablet runs Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, or as a woman might call it, “the Android screensaver.” Eurostar calls the ePad Femme "the first tablet specifically for ladies."

Several sites highlight that the tablet “comes in light pink.” Despite our best efforts, we’ve failed to find an image verifying that the actual body of the tablet is pink, so we assume this is in reference to the home screen wallpaper. Just as well, since what woman is going to figure out how to configure that, am I right? Settings, right? What even are they?

Speaking to the Jerusalem Post, Eurostar associate vice president of marketing Mani Nair said that the tablet comes with the preloaded womanly applications so the user can “just turn it on and log in to cooking recipes or yoga.” He went on to state that the ePad Femme “makes a perfect gadget for a woman who might find difficulties in terms of downloading these applications and it is a quick reference.”

The tablet has a 1.5GHz processor, 16GB of internal storage, and an SD card slot, but how a woman will ever work out either of those last two things are or what to do with them, one can’t be sure. She shouldn’t even need to—that clothing size converter app she was going to download? Already installed. Pregnancy app? Look no further.

Nair maintains that the intent of the ePad Femme tablet was not sexist. He compared it to another tablet the company offers, ePad Gamer, but those gamers are targeted by their interest, not their biological makeup. That seems like a pretty substantial difference.

A second interviewee of the Jerusalem Post, Dee Ann Javier, describes how her boyfriend did indeed give her an ePad Femme for Valentine’s Day. Surprisingly, her story does not begin “I broke up with my boyfriend because.” Instead, Javier notes the tablet’s “portability” and that she likes the color.

But a feminist blogger, Eman Al Nafjan, notes to the Jerusalem Post that women in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, where the tablet is sold, are “extremely tech-savvy” and don’t need apps downloaded for them. Women in those countries “spend a lot of time online.” They may work less but graduate from universities at higher rates than men, so they are just as well if not more educated.

We’ve taken down the pinkification of gadgets before, and the sexist marketing and targeting that goes along with them (sexism also goes in the other direction, with the hyper-masculine bent of brands like Motorola’s Droid phones). Not only does the ePad Femme continue this sorry tradition, but it takes it further. The ePad Femme bores into the functionality of the tablet itself, assuming that a women’s interests fit neatly into the stereotypical categories of fitness, weight loss, cooking, shopping, and having children.

The ePad Femme costs only $190, far less than the iPad and about the same as a Nexus 7. Go figure, the device has yet to be a big seller—as of mid-February, Eurostar had sold around 7,000 units. Given the number of affordable, gender-neutral, and yet still user-friendly tablets available, we are unsurprised.

Perhaps we go too far in assuming that these tablets are indeed only suited to a woman’s needs. Google co-founder Sergey Brin recently hit us with the revelation that smartphones are emasculating; maybe a pink tablet with a pregnancy app can do no worse.

Hm. I can't say I have any experience whatsoever with the geographical market these folks are aiming this tablet at, but I have a hard time believing that the women there would be incapable of operating a regular Android - tablet or an iPad.

So you don't know anybody that would be to afraid to download a random app from the android market even if it interests them somewhat? I'm certain there is a large number of people out there who don't want to go hunting on the market, but would prefer to have the most important/interesting apps pre-installed. Whether the pre-installed apps are any good for their target market we'll probably never know, because that would require to look at that product beyond some feminist raging.

WereCatf wrote:

In fact, I've heard that the women there are quite crafty as they've had to deal with thousands of years of straight-up oppression from males and have come to pick up new techniques quite quickly.

One could think that woman only bear woman and man only man.

WereCatf wrote:

I wonder how many of those 7000 sold products were actually picked up by women themselves instead of their husbands? If I were to hazard a guess I'd say very few.

So who do you think is buying all those female magazines which feature the same type of content?

WereCatf wrote:

Personally, if I were given one of these as a gifts and the giver was actually serious about it -- ie. not a joke-gift -- the relationship would end right there and then and he/she would quickly find this thing embedded deeply in his/her forehead.

So you don't know anybody that would be to afraid to download a random app from the android market even if it interests them somewhat?

No, I don't.

Quote:

I'm certain there is a large number of people out there who don't want to go hunting on the market, but would prefer to have the most important/interesting apps pre-installed.

Did you have look at the selection of the apps pre-installed on this thing? It doesn't include any sort of a web-browser, a way to communicate with others, any method for finding information that's not already pre-installed or even a god damn calculator? It's an extremely limited and stereotyped selection there.

Quote:

So who do you think is buying all those female magazines which feature the same type of content?

Magazines also happen to be non-interactive objects and don't cost $200 a pop.

Did you have look at the selection of the apps pre-installed on this thing? It doesn't include any sort of a web-browser, a way to communicate with others, any method for finding information that's not already pre-installed or even a god damn calculator? It's an extremely limited and stereotyped selection there.

I actually checked the linked resources and it's pretty obvious that it comes with the standard Android stuff.

WereCatf wrote:

Magazines also happen to be non-interactive objects and don't cost $200 a pop.

So what, it's still the woman who buy that content, which seems to be impossible for you to image.

This tablet should flop, but if for whatever reason it doesn't, it essentially means that despite your beliefs, Eurostar is right, and you're wrong.

I thought the same with Apple products, I thought that their price premiums anti-consumer behaviour shouldn't still be competitive today, I was wrong.

Similarly with Twilight, which feminists tend to hate, yet is a smashing success with women.

If women don't buy this tablet, then good, but if they do, what tablet they choose is not for you to decide.

I mostly agree but Caseys spite is well earned. Stupid consumers eating stuff like this up is the reason why we can't have nice things. She isn't deciding for anyone. She is giving a crappy product the review it deserves.

Seriously, as much as I think this sounds stupid - which unsurprisingly isn't selling well - where do you draw the line between content, presentation and medium?

I don't suppose too many people are upset about "women's" magazines apps like Cosmopolitan et al., or indeed "men's" magazines. So clearly there are subsets of both men and women who are interested in gender specific content, and maybe that shouldn't surprise us.

But how do you feel about rebranding the same content? How about "women's" socks, ski jackets, or Wellington boots? Are they not just like "men's" versions only pink with sparkles? Many women wear standard, gender neutral wellies of course, but some like the ones with frogs eyes on.

It looks like this shePad is just the same Android tablet that the company is selling to gamers etc only with a pink wallpaper and a few preloaded apps. It's not like they tried to rewrite the OS.

This would be a more interesting story if the tablet was actually selling well.

It struck me while viewing the app selection displayed within the graphic of the ePad Femme, that all these tech challenged gals may not realize just how much money they could save in parfum app purchases if they'd simply dial back usage of the Curry app.

For over a decade now I've noticed that if you look at the people around you on the train/underground/bus the number of women fiddling with their mobile phone/ereader/tablet far outweighs the men.

A 2006 study in Switzerland found that girls get their first mobile earlier than boys, and that "significantly more women than men have assimilated the mobile phone as a central component of their personal existence".

Well, Sergey did say that the touchscreen is emasculating...

PS: Going by the sales numbers, I think it is safe to assume that there are 6,999 newly single women in this world. That's 6,999 more chances to not be forever alone for me. Hooray!

Hey, an 8" tablet for $190 with an SD slot and ICS? If I didn't already have a Nexus 7 I'd probably look at this pretty closely, and I'm a dude. Of course everyone knows dudes are dumber than the ladies.

People complain when they don't get shit pre-installed on a product. Once someone pre-installs the shit for them, they complain that they get shit pre-installed on a product.

If a company produces black product, they want white product. If they produce white product they want black product. If they have both black and white products they ask for pink and blue products.

@Casey Johnston:I hope this tablet sells just so you get to rant some more. Why don't you get one and write a full review? Who knows, maybe you will end up liking it.

The most prominent thing you'd want to see on it is the settings icon and the app store (Play store, since it's Android).

And maybe I would rather read an honest review, even a negative one, instead of this sarcasm spat fest?

We get it, you are a woman, you are proud, indepedent, and tough, you can change your car tire alone, and you also don't need anyone to preload shit to your tablet. Can we get on with our lives now? Because there is no substance here in this article -- it's just a feminist rant.

And maybe I would rather read an honest review, even a negative one, instead of this sarcasm spat fest?

We get it, you are a woman, you are proud, indepedent, and tough, you can change your car tire alone, and you also don't need anyone to preload shit to your tablet. Can we get on with our lives now? Because there is no substance here in this article -- it's just a feminist rant.

If you think that Casey's review was a "feminist rant" then I'm guessing you haven't actually spent much time listening to or reading ACTUAL feminist rants.

(sexism also goes in the other direction, with the hyper-masculine bent of brands like HTC’s Droid phones)

Did you mean the Moto Droid phones? The HTC ones look just like the rest of their Android lineup. Either way, I don't quite see how they'd be considered hyper-masculine. Most of the people I see with Droid-branded phones (outside of the Droid X/2 which is equal) are girls, though that's usually for the keyboards on the Moto Droid n series. If anything, I'd say the stock Android theme is more oriented toward males than anything that's been put out by a third party.

Was gonna say, my wife has one of those hyper masculine Droids. I've got a windows phone, go figure. Oh and I'll have to let my wife know that Casey Johnston thinks she's hyper masculine. (chuckle) The kids will be amused.

I keep an ongoing informal survey of the devices men and women use on BART commuter trains (Fremont line, for you Bay Areans). Then has always been a pronounced difference in both the device, and what is done with the device, according to gender.

Men have iPads. They play games, watch videos, and do work. Women have Kindles...most often the simple monochrome Kindles rather than the fire...and they read. The gender split was was most evident a while ago, and has narrowed somewhat over time (meaning:I'm no longer surprised to see a woman with an iPad.)

And maybe I would rather read an honest review, even a negative one, instead of this sarcasm spat fest?

We get it, you are a woman, you are proud, indepedent, and tough, you can change your car tire alone, and you also don't need anyone to preload shit to your tablet. Can we get on with our lives now? Because there is no substance here in this article -- it's just a feminist rant.

If you think that Casey's review was a "feminist rant" then I'm guessing you haven't actually spent much time listening to or reading ACTUAL feminist rants.

I guess I am lucky then?

I could have turned a blind eye at this article, and treated it as a harmless attempt at humor because it is funny and it made me laugh.

The problem I have with this article is that many people reading it will see it as a product review which it clearly isn't -- Casey did not get herself an ePad, used it for a few days, and then wrote this.

If she did, then writing such an article would be ok because that would be an honest review which would tell us things like battery life, how easy is to remove default apps install other apps and change home screen, what are its default privacy settings, is the device fast, does it feel well-built, how is the screen, camera and sound quality, etc. That would have been an usefull review regardless of the tone.

Could Casey write a Samsung Galaxy S 4 review without using it?

Of course she could, but saying things like "I don't like this stereotypical manly blue wallpaper depicting a sports car with a half-naked woman inside because it is appealing to male population" would not tell us anything about the product itself, only about her own opinion and prejudices.

I double-checked, and this article was indeed filed under "Gear & Gadgets / Product News & Reviews", not under "Editorials" or "Opinions". That is why I was expecting a review, not this rant.